by Naima Simone
USA TODAY bestselling author NAIMA SIMONE’s love of romance was first stirred by Mills & Boon books pilfered from her grandmother. Now she spends her days writing sizzling romances with a touch of humour and snark.
She is wife to her own real-life superhero and mother to two awesome kids. They live in perfect domestically challenged bliss in the southern United States.
Also by Naima Simone
The Billionaire’s Bargain
Black Tie Billionaire
Blame It on the Billionaire
Discover more at millsandboon.co.uk
Vows in Name Only
Naima Simone
www.millsandboon.co.uk
ISBN: 978-0-008-90470-8
VOWS IN NAME ONLY
© 2020 Naima Simone
Published in Great Britain 2020
by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF
All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.
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To Gary. 143.
Contents
Cover
About the Author
Booklist
Title Page
Copyright
Note to Readers
Dedication
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Seventeen
Eighteen
About the Publisher
One
“What the hell are you talking about?” Cain Farrell snarled, surging from his chair in his father’s library.
His dead father’s library.
Barron Farrell had to be dead for Cain to step foot in the mausoleum where he’d suffered a hellish childhood. As soon as he’d graduated from college at twenty-one, he’d left and never returned for a birthday, a Christmas, an Easter or even a potluck dinner. It was bad enough he’d spent twelve-hour workdays with his father at the offices of Farrell International, the conglomerate that had been in his family for four generations. But he’d vowed eleven years ago to never again grace the hallowed halls and marble floors of his father’s historic Beacon Hill mansion.
It figured the old man would do something as contrary as having a heart attack and dying just to get Cain to break his promise.
He’d always been a manipulative bastard.
Speaking of bastards...
Cain stalked across the gleaming hardwood floor, ignoring the dark leather furniture gathered around a cavernous fireplace, the winding staircase leading to the next level, the floor-to-cathedral ceiling shelves packed with first editions of the classics his father had never bothered to read. If Cain looked too long, the memories always lurking at the edges of his mind would seize the opportunity to slither in and torment him. To inflict punishments like the ones he’d received in front of the very desk behind which Daryl Holleran, his father’s personal attorney, perched.
God, Cain hated this room. This whole goddamn house.
Fury bristled inside him. He drew to a halt in front of a large bay window, but the view of the private walled garden didn’t consume his attention. No, the other two men sitting silently in the room claimed that distinction.
Two strangers he’d never laid eyes on before this afternoon. Two strangers whose presence had been requested at the reading of Barron’s will.
Two strangers who, according to Daryl, were Cain’s brothers.
Half brothers.
“Cain,” Daryl said, his smooth baritone placating, as if he hadn’t just announced that the multibillion-dollar company Cain had been groomed to run was no longer his. “I know this is surprising—”
Cain snorted, pivoting and jabbing his tightly balled fists into the pockets of his black suit pants. “Surprising? No, surprising is Big Papi coming out of retirement and returning to the Sox. Surprising is finally discovering the location of Jimmy Hoffa’s body. Surprising is the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse riding down Commonwealth. This, Daryl, is bullshit,” he snapped.
To his credit, the older man didn’t flinch at Cain’s caustic tone. But then again, Daryl had been Barron Farrell’s lawyer for the past thirty years. The man probably had skin as thick as an elephant’s ass.
“Be that as it may,” Daryl said, picking up the small stack of papers from the desk, “it was your father’s decision, and Barron was adamant and very clear about the terms. Controlling shares in Farrell International are to go to his living heirs. But only if you and your brothers agree to remain in Boston and run the company together for the period of a year, starting from the date this will is read. At the end of the year, you can decide to helm it together, or Cain, you can buy out your brothers’ shares and Farrell International is yours. If any of you refuse to adhere to these conditions, then the company and all its subsidiaries will be liquidated and sold to the highest bidders.”
It didn’t make any more sense the second time around.
“There’s one more stipulation,” Daryl added.
“Of course there is,” Cain growled.
“It concerns you, Cain.” Daryl paused, and for the first time, Cain glimpsed uneasiness flash in the older man’s brown eyes. Which set off an almost painful tightening of his stomach. If this unflappable man was discomfited, t
hat spelled trouble for Cain. “You must spend the next year here. In this house.”
Cain didn’t move—couldn’t. Because if he even dragged in a breath, he would explode, and the fury that howled inside him would consume this room and the people in it. Barron hadn’t been satisfied with hijacking Cain’s future. No, he had to manipulate his son into his own personal nightmare.
That son of a bitch.
“So just because the asshole who knocked up my mother demands it, I’m supposed to give up my life in Washington and move here?” The bearded giant in the black thermal shirt, faded jeans and battered brown boots who Daryl had called Achilles shook his head. “She might have given me his last name, but that’s all I got from him. I don’t owe him a damn thing.”
Or you.
Achilles didn’t say the words aloud, but they quivered in the air, and Cain ground his teeth together. Of course, the possible dismantlement of the business Cain had worked on for most of his life wouldn’t affect this man. Losing the business for which he had endured the intolerant, merciless Barron, the business Cain had dreamed of one day heading...that wouldn’t concern this man either.
He hadn’t suffered for it.
Hadn’t sacrificed for it.
But Cain had.
It was his legacy. His due for surviving and outliving Barron Farrell.
And yet, Barron had found a way to rip it all out from under him.
“I have to admit, when I received the phone call to attend this mysterious gathering, I wasn’t expecting a family reunion,” the second man, Kenan Rhodes, drawled, eyebrows arched over the distinctive blue-gray eyes they all shared. Farrell eyes. “But I have to agree with Achilles, is it?” At the giant’s nod, Kenan shrugged a suit jacket–covered shoulder. “I have a position with my family’s business. A good one. And leaving it would be like turning my back on them. What would be my incentive to do that? I didn’t know Barron Farrell personally, but I am aware of his reputation. And no offense, but I have no reason to give him my loyalty.”
Cain stared at the two strangers, and though the will had announced them as brothers, he felt no pull toward them. No familial connection. Hell, except for the eyes, none of them would be mistaken for family.
Kenan, with his light brown skin, close-cropped dark hair and neat goatee, was biracial. Though they all shared tall, muscular frames, Cain and Kenan were wide-shouldered and lean, while Achilles boasted a broad, powerful build that wouldn’t be out of place on a football defensive line. Add in the shoulder-length, nearly black, curly hair, beard and tawny skin and he rounded out the most diverse family tree since Brad and Angelina’s children.
Still... That Cain’s father had cheated on his mother didn’t shock him. His infidelity hadn’t been a secret in their house. What astonished him was that Barron had fathered not one, but two illegitimate children. Barron might not have cared where he stuck his dick but the thought that he would leave the fate of his company to the whims of men he hadn’t known? Cain couldn’t line that up with the controlling bastard his father had been.
But then, apparently Barron had been aware of his sons all the time. And he hadn’t bothered to acknowledge their existence until it benefited him. Until he could shift and maneuver all three of them like pawns on a chessboard.
Now that coincided with the Barron Farrell Cain knew.
“I don’t expect your loyalty, and I’m not asking for it,” Cain stated. His flat tone belied the anger and yes, fear, roiling in his veins. “Both of you are right—you have your lives. But today, mine just changed forever. Not only did I find out I have two brothers I never knew existed, but everything I’ve—” suffered for “—worked for is suddenly not in my control but in the hands of strangers who, as you put it, don’t owe me a damn thing. Yes, you can walk away, and nothing changes for you. For me, though? Everything changes. I don’t have the option of walking away.”
Panic welled up in him. “I don’t have—”
A legacy. Control. Power. A voice.
His teeth snapped shut, grinding together, trapping those betraying words inside him. Trapping the plea that would inevitably follow.
Had his father resented him this much—hated him this much—that even from the grave he relished the thought of Cain humiliating himself to beg these strangers to help him? To save him?
Yes. Yes, he had.
The swift and concise answer rebounded against Cain’s skull and everything he’d ever felt for his father—rage, grief, confusion, bitterness and God help him, love—swirled in his chest like a tornado.
“Fuck this,” he growled, stalking across the room and wrenching the heavy library door open to storm out. Air. He needed air that wasn’t tainted by his desperation and helplessness. By his weakness.
Almost immediately the incongruous sounds of gaiety slapped him as he stepped into the hallway. Right. The reception. How screwed up was it that the circus in the library had temporarily made him forget that over a hundred people congregated in the great room and formal dining room to mourn his father? He snorted. Mourn, hell. From the loud chatter, bright laughter and clink of glassware, he couldn’t tell if they were all there to celebrate his life—or his death.
Exhaling, Cain pivoted sharply and strode toward the rear of the house, in the opposite direction of his “guests.” In his current mood, he wasn’t good company and he damn sure didn’t feel like fielding condolences.
At least Barron was in a better place.
If one could call hell a better place.
Two
Devon Cole frowned at the wall of shrubbery in front of her, two thoughts prevalent in her mind.
One, how in the world did the gardener manage to keep the leaves so green and lush in the middle of October? A special fertilizer? A new pesticide? The blood of virgins?
And two, if she waited a few seconds longer, would David Bowie dressed as the Goblin King appear wearing his eyebrow-raising buff breeches and Tina Turner hair?
They were both fair questions considering she stood outside in a garden with high, labyrinthine hedges that formed cozy nooks and convenient, romantic hiding places. Who would’ve thought such a beautiful, magical place could exist behind a cold mausoleum of a mansion? Unless this was where the owner banished those who displeased him to be devoured by a voracious minotaur?
Oh, and a third thought... She peered down into the flute of red wine she clasped in her hand. Should this third glass of cabernet sauvignon be her last? When a person started wondering about garden tips, David Bowie’s codpiece and Greek mythology in the space of ten seconds, laying off the booze might be wise.
Sighing, she stared down into her glass. She’d only briefly met Barron Farrell a few times at the social events her father had browbeaten her into attending, but still... The dead deserved respect. If not for Barron, then at least for the son he’d left behind.
Her belly clenched as an image of Cain Farrell coalesced in her mind. She’d never encountered Barron Farrell’s son and heir before today; not surprising since she tried to avoid the galas, charity events and dinner parties her father so loved.
Closing her eyes, she sank to one of the marble benches dotting the cool, shadowed corners of the garden. She’d attended the crowded, solemn funeral at the ornate Catholic church, but only at the graveside ceremony had she captured her first view of Cain Farrell. Even from several rows back, it hadn’t been hard to spot him. Not when he towered above most of the people there.
Even unsmiling and stoic, he’d been...beautiful. A lean, angular face with slashing cheekbones, almost brutally perfect lines, a carnal yet hard mouth and a stark, uncompromising jaw. His black, slim-fitting, ruthlessly tailored suit had molded to wide shoulders, broad chest, slim waist and long, muscular legs. A king. He reminded her of a king who bore authority as his birthright, but who’d have no issue with throwing on armor and hefting a sword and shield to fight b
eside his men. Commanding, formidable, and merciless when warranted. Matter of fact, the only thing soft about him had been the thick, dark waves combed back from his face and curling around his ears and the collar of his jacket. Yet, instead of gentling his imposing, arrogant beauty, those incongruously soft strands only emphasized the blunt, raw strength of his facial features, especially the hint of cruelty in the sensual curves of his mouth...
Shame threaded through her.
He’d been mourning his father, and she’d been ogling him as if he’d been Mr. December in a Billionaires of the Year calendar. Maybe her father was right, and he really couldn’t take her anywhere.
A piercing longing stabbed her in the chest, and she pressed a palm over her heart, rubbing the phantom soreness. Ten years she’d been in this world of wealth, and she still didn’t fit in. No amount of etiquette classes or designer wardrobes could remedy that.
What she wouldn’t give to be gone from this Beacon Hill home, hell, from Boston, and be back in their old house in Plainfield, New Jersey, that had been full of family, with her and her parents on one side of the duplex, and her uncle, aunt and three cousins on the other. Their home had been crowded, relatives flowing from one apartment to the other with slamming doors, loud voices and laughter. Their home had been happy.
That had been before her mother had died from a lingering cough that she’d refused to see the doctor about. A cough that had evolved into a severe case of pneumonia. That had been before her father had channeled his grief, anger and ambition into growing his chain of electronics stores, eventually selling to a larger company. That had been before he’d invested profit from the sale in a tech company that would lead the industry in defense-level security and go from respectably wealthy to filthy rich.
That had been before he decided Plainfield was too “boorish” for him and his daughter—his words, not hers. She loved her hometown, loved her family. But he’d cut off all ties and moved them to Boston where his job had become infiltrating the rarified ranks of the blue bloods of high society. Ranks into which all his nouveau riche money couldn’t buy entrance.